ATI stapt in de markt voor geïntegreerde chipsets voor low-end pc systemen, aldus dit nieuwsbericht op The Register:
Yesterday's announcement was a direct response to Intel's challenge, but this is clearly an issue that has been bothering ATI for some time. Last year's takeover of Chromatic positioned ATI to move into the set-top box market with a mix of Chromatic's system-on-a-chip products and its own 2D/3D graphics and TV/DVD decoder products.However, that mix also allows ATI to attack the low-end PC market, a move turned from a sideline into a necessity by the chipset vendors' moves into graphics. Even processor vendor Cyrix is getting in on the act -- its upcoming MIII chip also integrates graphics acceleration on the die, and will be aimed at the same sector.
ATI's sales pitch centres on its Shared Memory Architecture (SMA), which integrates North Bridge and graphics acceleration chipsets, and hooks them in to the PC's main memory bank, eliminating the need for dedicated VRAM. The company promises a "full family" of SMA-based products. Samples will come on stream in the second half of the year.
